An observant commentator

[Crocodylus]

It is not very often that one finds informed commentary on the comment threads following most articles online. In fact, the vast majority of comments make their original publishers look foolish. However, on Yahoo!News, not the likeliest of places in which to find informed commentary, I found the following comment by an American reader known as "Tran Thai Tong".

The longest conflict in history consisted of the wars that were fought between Persian and Roman empires, the SUPERPOWERS of their age. These wars lasted 795 years. By the end of this period the citizens of both of these SUPERPOWERS were angry, exhausted, and frustrated financially and morally. Both of these empires had reached the last stage that ANY SUPERPOWER will INEVITABLY reach. At this stage, the economical, financial, and moral prices of maintaining the status-quo of a superpower, much less expanding it, outruns the benefits of maintaining such status-quo. This will make the decline of ANY SUPERPOWER inevitable. It is sad and painful, but as taxpayers we should realize that America is currently at this stage. This is best evidenced in America's Incredible Debt Shock (AIDS (politically)) of $17,000,000,000,000, our disastrous healthcare system, and our failing education system, which allows the cheapest of state universities charge each resident full-time student around $10,000 per year on tuition alone.
If America gradually quits its SUPERPOWER status, all of its taxpayers will be better off, because all of these trillions of dollars that are spent to keep this status-quo will be spent at home, to fight poverty, create jobs, and provide cheap, or even education and healthcare for all its citizens. This is what happened in Britain and France after both countries seized to be SUPERPOWERS.

My hat's off to this guy.

The original article can be found here: McCain: 'Russia is a gas station masquerading as a country'

[Officer of Engineers]

The downside is that you get pushed around by those who think you're full of crap and take your lands, ie the Visogoths and the Huns.

[DonBelt]

It would be nice from a taxpayer point of view- we didn't sign a contract saying we would be responsible for the defense of the world. But unfortunately we manage our affairs in this country (US) in such a way that we can't disengage from world affairs. We are dependent on resources only available to us from overseas sources, our trade passes through choke points bordered by unstable or failed/hostile nations, and we have citizens traveling everywhere. We would need to change a lot about ourselves and our habits before we could voluntarily quit superpower status. Even so, I would not give up a large, modern military. If history shows one thing, it's always that when a nation lets it's military decline or contract an urgent crisis will arise requiring it. And catch up is a hard and expensive game to play. Oh, and I would throw in somewhere in there "Nature abhors a vacuum".

[Doktor]

Don't look at France and UK. Their decline was backed by a superpower.

[DOR]

the cheapest of state universities charge each resident full-time student around $10,000 per year on tuition alone.

I guess no one bothered to consider scholarships . . .

[GVChamp]

I don't see this as "informed commentary." This is the normal doom and gloom pessmism that suggests lowering expectations, that you see in pretty much every online article. I guess it's good that he knows about the long standing Persian-Roman rivalry, but that doesn't apply to the US at all.
Compare 1970s America to modern America and get back to me about how modern America cannot afford a global foot-print.

[Officer of Engineers]

What global footprint?

[GVChamp]

Are you referring to the 70s or aughts?

[Officer of Engineers]

Now. The WWIII armies are gone. Never to come back.

[kato]

we didn't sign a contract saying we would be responsible for the defense of the world.

Actually you did just that - along with Russia, France, the UK and the Republic of China - in 1949.

[GVChamp]

Alright, running with that, how much of our force reduction do you think is a policy choice, and how much do you think is an unavoidable fact of life? Cause this guy is comparing the US over-stretch to the Romans fighting an eight century war, and that's not including the multiple civil wars and other barbarian incursions.
I don't think it's even fair to compare the problems of the US today to the problems of 1970s America. There's a crappy healthcare system, a crappy education system, and still going through the aftermath of Vietnam and racial integration.

[SteveDaPirate]

This guy seems to be confusing a relative decline in American power with an absolute decline. If American power is declining it is not because of any impending collapse in American society, it is because the rest of the world is finally catching up. Between WWII and states that were mostly pre-industrial (China, India) until recently, it is hardly a surprise that the rest of the world would start catching up. This does not suddenly indicate that America will suddenly fall crumble and fall into obscurity. It just means the United States might soon have a near peer.

These comparisons with historical superpowers such as Rome seem to miss the rather important detail that the United States is not in any position to be invaded either now or in the foreseeable future. Nuclear weapons are a great defensive weapon, but not terribly useful to an invader who wants to acquire useful territory. Not to mention that no country in the Western Hemisphere has the population to even consider an invasion of the United States. This means that any potential invasion would have to come from across an ocean.

The fact that even the mighty United States struggled to invade and occupy countries smaller than many of its constituent states on the other side of the world seems like a pretty good indication of the difficulty of such a feat. The idea that any country short of a superpower that spans all of Europe and Asia could successfully invade America is laughable.

Rome fell after centuries of warfare, and being repeatedly sacked and invaded by barbarian hordes. There are no hordes or invaders to threaten the United States, and short of a full nuclear exchange or terrible civil war, it will not be losing its superpower status anytime soon. The worst that will happen is that the U.S. will have some competition at the top.

[Doktor]

Yet the immigrants have no problem to sneak trough US borders and redistribute the wealth.

[kato]

The idea that any country short of a superpower that spans all of Europe and Asia could successfully invade America is laughable.

15% bigger military, a 15% bigger economy and 60% more population reserves. Without Asia. Or Eastern Europe. Only downside is 60% less spending on military...

[SteveDaPirate]

15% bigger military, a 15% bigger economy and 60% more population reserves. Without Asia. Or Eastern Europe. Only downside is 60% less spending on military...

Those margins are hardly enough to offset supply lines stretching across the Atlantic, a very well armed U.S. citizenry, and a fine military establishment. If the United States, with a number of allies, and established foreign bases struggled to occupy a piddling little country like Iraq, what makes you think Western Europe, even under a single political entity has any chance at all of a successful occupation of the United States?

What percentage of your population can you afford to send around the world without bankrupting your own economy? Is Western Europe, with their rapidly aging demographics going to come up with enough young men to do the job? Hardly.